Atishi clip doctored: Punjab Police in reply to Delhi Assembly Secretariat
Claim video falsely portrayed her as making derogatory remarks against Sikh Gurus
The Punjab Police on Thursday submitted a reply to the Delhi Legislative Assembly Secretariat regarding an FIR registered in connection with an alleged doctored video clip linked to former Delhi CM Atishi.
The Office of the Director General of Police (DGP), Punjab, said the matter arose after a written complaint was received on January 7 at the Cyber Crime Police Station, Jalandhar. The complaint alleged that certain video clips circulating on X showed misleading subtitles attributed to Atishi, falsely portraying her as making derogatory remarks against Sikh Gurus.
The complaint pointed out that the original video of the speech, later uploaded on Atishi’s official social media account, did not contain any such remarks, indicating deliberate editing and manipulation intended to hurt religious sentiments and disturb communal harmony.
“After examining the complaint and the digital material, the police found that the allegations disclosed cognisable offences. Accordingly, FIR No. 2 dated January 7 was registered against unknown persons under relevant provisions of the BNS and the Information Technology Act,” it added.
The police stated that during the investigation, one of the widely circulated video clips was downloaded from a publicly available social media URL following due procedure, with digital evidence preserved and certified. The material was then forwarded to the State Forensic Science Laboratory, SAS Nagar (Mohali), for priority examination. The forensic report categorically stated that the word “Guru” was not uttered by the speaker in the audio extracted from the video under examination.
The reply further clarified that the video clips in question were edited and circulated outside the Delhi Assembly and were sourced from social media platforms. Since the clips were neither published by nor under the authority of the House, legislative privilege did not apply in this case.
The police also made it clear that no FIR had been registered against Atishi for her speech inside the House and that the investigation was confined to the acts of clipping, cropping and digitally manipulating the video by unknown persons outside the Assembly.
Highlighting the law-and-order context, the reply noted that Punjab shared its border with Pakistan and had a long history of cross-border terrorism and internal disturbances with religious undertones. Given the rapid and far-reaching reach of social media content, the police said it was imperative to act swiftly to prevent any threat to public order and communal harmony.
